Toll road nuisances

Toll roads in India were very rare a decade ago. Then
only highways used to be tolled and those traveling interstate only had to cough
up tolls. Now every other road is getting converted into toll roads-
irrespective of how good they are and what value they add. In some cities like
Bangalore, there’re alternate roads if you don’t want to use toll road (example
Electronic city flyover, NICE Road etc) but in cities like Chennai, there’re no
alternatives.

This post is about some of the nuisances of toll roads-
particularly to the residents who reside around the area.

On theory, residents along the roll roads will be given
a pass which allows them to use the road without paying the toll, but
practicality is different. Below are some of the key points:

Only those who own a vehicle will get the pass- one
should give details of the vehicle and vehicle registration address should be
inside the roll area. This raises following questions: what about who don’t own
a car but use a rented vehicle? Since they are bonafide residents of the area
they should be allowed to go free. But this doesn’t happen.

When car pooling, if the other car doesn’t have a pass,
bonafide residents have to shell out money

Pass is not applicable to commercial vehicles. If I am a
taxi driver and if my home is inside toll area, end of the day I wish to go home
and rest, but toll gate won’t let me through for free, since mine is a
commercial vehicle.

One should give passport as a address proof- getting
passport is a big mess at present and toll company will not reimburse thousands
one has to shell out to get passport. Why not accept other govt documents? Why
should one get a passport for toll purpose if he/she never plans to leave the
country?

Toll companies set up barricades on the bylanes around
the toll plaza- this is to prevent vehicles from using these roads and not
paying toll- but this causes inconvenience to local resides, as they need to
take a longer route and pay toll, if their home happens to be on the wrong side
of the barricare. What is their fault?

There is no SLA for toll companies to fix the potholes
or complete work. In Chennai’s OMR, 3 full years since toll collection has
started, service road is yet to be completed, bus shelters are yet to be
created, people hardly use FOBS. Several highways – particularly NH4 near Sriperambadur and road between
Krishnagiri and Salem section have developed lots of bad sections. Even after
months they’re not fixed. If the roads are not maintained, tolls should be
discounted no?

Even when part of the roads are under construction, there's no discount on toll fee. Travel between Tumkur-Chitradurga to experience this.

Local residents will have to shell more fuel, because
they need to go kms at a stretch to take a U-turn. Some provisions are made for
people to cross roll roads- FOB etc, but what about animals- how are they
supposed to cross the road? Locals also pay with their life due to speeding
traffic on toll roads.

Smart card schemes are available to enable speedy
clearance at toll gates, but the customers are charged extra towards maintenance
of smart card system- Isn’t the toll company also a beneficiary of this? (as
they can have more cars passing through in given amount of
time)

Return ticket validation is limited to 24 hours (sometimes till same day mid night)- why not
1 week? Those leaving Friday night and returning Monday morning will have to
buy two one way tickets.

In South India tolls are relatively less. In Maharastra
locals set up their own toll booths and loot from outstation
vehicles.

In Chennai, one of the gates of IT Park is intentionally
kept closed, to ensure that everyone uses the longer road that passes through
toll gate…

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5 comments:

Indeed, even I have noticed the spurt in the number of toll gates around my city as well. How much money are we going to end up paying in this fashion? There's too much of taxation happening around. Good post.

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When we lived in Gurgaon we suffered from toll plaza at times for 40 min one way as it was a mess. Then they changed the toll from 20 to 21 or 22 increasing the problem. So much for planning of our Toll Roads.